


Ghost Watch: Season 3, Episode 4

by srmiller



Series: Ghost Watch [1]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Bellarke, Ghosts, Grief, Modern Universe, Multi, ghost hunters/adventures au, minty, mostly general interactions, wicken
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-01
Updated: 2015-11-01
Packaged: 2018-04-28 07:52:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5083879
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/srmiller/pseuds/srmiller
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Hey guys, it’s me, Bellamy Blake, and tonight on Ghost Watch we’re going to be investigate a house owned by Clarke Griffin. Her roommates, Monty Green and Jasper Jordan, called us in to investigate their home. Now, you guys know that to prevent contamination and suggestibility, we don’t know anything about what has happened in this home or its history. But me, my sister Octavia, and our friend Nathan Miller aren’t going in blind, either. Our tech whizzes, Raven Reyes and Kyle Wick, will have our backs in the tech center.</p><p>Welcome to Ark, Virginia. Welcome to Ghost Watch."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ghost Watch: Season 3, Episode 4

“I’m going to murder you both and then this house will really be haunted.”

Clarke stormed across the living room of the plantation house she shared with Monty and Jasper until she was nearly nose to nose with them and couldn’t decide if she was angry or furious. “I can't believe you did this behind my back.”

Monty and Jasper glanced at each other. To Clarke’s frustration neither of them showed an ounce of remorse. Worse, they didn’t seem particularly afraid of her either but Jasper did hold up his hands in surrender. “In our defense, we didn’t think they’d really pick us.”

“We’re only minimally haunted after all,” Monty pointed out.

“We are not haunted,” Clarke hissed. “This is an old house and you two are crazy.”

“So you’re saying your paintings moved on their own?” Jasper challenged.

“I’m saying I probably moved them and forgot,” Clarke argued for what she imagined was the hundredth time. Even to her own ears, though, her tone lacked conviction. A month ago she’d gone down to her studio and found her father’s portrait on the easel when she would have bet her life it had been on the floor night before, waiting to be framed.

The only thing she could think to explain the reason for its move was she’d gotten up in the middle of the night and moved it before going back to bed, but just thinking about it made her itchy between her shoulder blades.

“What about the doors?” Jasper challenged, “You’re not seriously trying to say they’re opening by themselves.”

“You mean the very old doors which probably need new hinges?” Clarke countered.

“Old hinges stick,” Monty reminded her. “Not make things easier to open.”

“So my moved paintings and doors opening was enough to get the crew of Ghost Watch to come to this backwoods college town to investigate our supposedly haunted house?”

“Technically, your haunted house," said Jasper. “Which is why you’re the one who was supposed to sign the contracts which allow them to film.”

"Wait, _supposed_ to sign?" Clarke spluttered. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Monty and Jasper exchanged looks. "We may have forged your signature on the contracts and sent them to the producer. They'll be here next week."

“For fuck’s sake, Jasper.” Clarke ran a hand through her hair, “I really am going to kill you both.”

“Oh, come on. What’s the worst that can happen?” Monty argued. “They come, they hang out in our house for a night while we stay at a cushy hotel and then they leave again.”

Clarke felt her resolution to refuse weaken. She could use a night in a hotel. For the past week she’d been drowning herself in her thesis work and couldn’t remember what it felt like to not have tension in her neck and shoulders. Dreams of a big Jacuzzi tub and room service danced prettily in her head.

“I am not getting on camera saying I believe in ghosts,” she asserted, though she couldn't muster up any heat. Oh God, was she really agreeing to this?

“Awesome!" Jasper high fived Monty. "I’m going to call the producer Maya and tell her we’re a go.”

Monty stayed as Jasper ran off to his bedroom upstairs. It didn’t escape Clarke’s notice that while Jasper was still on the stairs there was the sound of footsteps on the floor above her.

“You know something weird is going on here," Monty told her.

“You guys have watched way too many episodes of Ghost Watch. It’s just the house settling. It is an old house, Monty.”

“So maybe it'll turn out to be nothing. But if it helps, the people on the show are all super hot.”

Clarke sighed and couldn’t help but respond to Monty’s grin. “It helps a little.”

##############################

When Clarke finally accepted the show was coming, she binge watched the first two seasons and was reluctantly impressed by the way the crew conducted themselves.

In order to prevent contamination the watchers, as they called themselves, knew next to nothing about the houses and buildings they were going to investigate. Instead, the tech expert, a woman by the name of Raven Reyes, and her partner Wick (whom Clarke suspected was more than just her partner on set) interviewed the residents or owners of the supposedly haunted buildings.

The three people who went into the houses to make contact with the spirits, brother and sister Bellamy and Octavia Blake and the inscrutable Nathan Miller, knew nothing which meant anything they sensed, heard, or saw would come from their own observations and not from suggestions given by the crazies.

 _Witnesses_ , Clarke corrected herself on the day of the crew's arrival. They piled out of a black van with the show's logo on the sides and she had to admit Monty was right: they were hot.

Jasper all but hopped from one foot to the other on the last step of the porch in anticipation, while Monty stood calm next to him in the outfit he’d picked after choosing and discarding four others.

The guy she considered to be in charge stepped to the front of the group. Both Monty and Jasper eagerly shook his hand, and there was more than a little hero worship in Jasper’s eyes.

Oh boy, was Clarke definitely regretting this.

“Hi, I’m Bellamy Blake," said the newcomer. "Which one of you is Clarke?”

“I am,” Clarke answered from her spot.

He looked up at her with dark eyes, though from this distance she couldn’t see their color. She could, however, definitely feel the spark of something shivering down her spine.

She was kicking the guys out the first chance she had. Jesus, she didn’t have time for this.

“I’m Clarke Griffin.” she said as she held out her hand.

“Nice to meet you,” he smiled as he shook it and there was something about the curve of it which immediately made her want to punch him in the face.

Maybe it was the arrogance, or the fact she immediately wanted to make out with him.

It was 50/50.

Letting go of his hand as if was suddenly a hot rock she took a quick step back. “Nice to meet you, Mr. Blake.”

“Bellamy,” he corrected. “Thanks for letting us come into your home.”

“A metaphorical gun was put to my head by my roommates,” she clarified, looking around Bellamy’s shoulder (who needed shoulders that wide anyway?) to glare at Monty and Jasper. To her annoyance, they didn't even notice since they were meeting the other members of the crew.

“Ah.” There was a world’s worth of condescension in the single syllable and skewed the ratio 90/10 in favor of punching him. “You’re a skeptic.”

“Yes. But I love my roommates and there were rumors of a hotel room.”

He grinned, quick and bright. Okay, maybe it was more like 80/20.  You could want to punch someone's face and still want to make out with them, right?

“Yes, you guys get to hang out in a swanky hotel while we wander around your house all night.”

“I’ll make sure to hide my lingerie.”

He stuck his hands in his pockets and rolled back on his heels, smile still firmly in place. “We don’t touch lingerie unless invited first.”

“Shame, you must not get to touch a lot of lingerie then.”

He barked out a laugh as his sister, a willowy brunette with long brown hair and a ready smile, came up to greet them. “I’m Octavia. You’ve got an amazing house.”

“Thanks, I got it-“

“No spoilers,” Bellamy interrupted. “Did your roommates not tell you the rules?”

“They did.” She hadn’t needed them to after her binge-watch, but she wasn’t about to admit to to her roommates she’d spent 36 plus hours watching a show about haunted houses when she’d adamantly refused to admit they existed. She certainly wasn’t about to admit it to this guy either. “But I didn’t think how I came into possession of the house would be that important.”

“You never know what might be relevant later,” Octavia explained gently as if to make up for her brother’s rudeness. “But I can’t wait to hear the story later. Come on, I’ll introduce you to the rest of the group while my brother figures out where he put his manners.”

“O-“

“Nope,” she interrupted. “You were being an ass. I could tell from the yard."  Taking Clarke’s arm to lead her away, she added, "Other than my brother, everyone else is super nice except for Nathan, who is stoic.”

Clarke smiled, endeared by the younger woman’s friendliness and allowed herself to be pulled away and introduced to the rest of the crew.

A tall blonde man stood with his arm slung over a pretty, smirking Hispanic girl while a dark skinned man stood close to Monty. She recognized the early signs of infatuation in her friend’s eyes. When she met Jasper’s grin she realized he’d noticed the same thing.

“Guys, this is Clarke," Octavia announced. “Bellamy was being mean.”

“I wasn’t being mean,” Bellamy argued from behind them.

“You were thinking about it,” Octavia shot back without looking over her shoulder and Clarke stifled a laugh at how efficiently she’d shut her brother down. “So, this is Raven and Wick, they’re the techs and they’re going to be the ones interviewing you. This is Nathan, he’s our camera man in the house during the investigation, you’ve met my brother Bellamy who likes to pretend he’s in charge, and I’m Octavia.”

As she shook hands with the others, Clarke was surprised to find they were all about her age. Here she was stressing over school and these people were traveling around the world making a television show.

She was beginning to wonder about her life choices.

“While Raven and Wick interview you, we’ll be wandering around the property getting b-roll, doing our own little observations and what not,” Octavia explained. “When you’re done you’ll give us a tour of your place so we don’t get lost in the middle of the night. Does that work okay for you?”

Clarke nodded, not really certain her agreement was necessary. Octavia was beautiful but mildly terrifying, like a steamroller painted pink.

“Great. We’ll catch up with you in a bit.” Octavia turned and grabbed her brother’s arm and dragged him away from the group. “Come on, bro, you can check her out later.”

After they’d taken a few steps away, Jasper sighed, “She’s hot.”

“So is her brother,” Monty added with a small smile.

Yep. She was really, really going to regret this.

##############################

Twenty minutes later, after Jasper’s interview had finished, Clarke was being rigged with a mic. She’d observed the process from a safe distance so she’d know what to expect when it was her turn and watching the two members of the show's tech team work together was oddly calming, almost like watching a dance.  

Raven seemed to be the one in charge and while she and Wick relentlessly teased each other she seemed to respect her counterpart. What Clarke hadn’t known from the show, because she was almost always sitting, was Raven walked with a limp.

Wick more than compensated for her lack of mobility though, predicting her needs with almost clairvoyant accuracy so she didn’t have to move more than necessary. Not until he’d gone off to get drinks did Clarke get a chance to ask the question which had been burning in her mind since she’d seen them in person for the first time.

“You and Wick. Are you guys are a thing?”

Raven cast her a glance of calculated suspicion. “Why? You thinking of hitting on him?”

“No, but I did binge watch your guys’ first two seasons-which stays between us, by the way-and he followed you around with ‘Property of Raven Reyes’ on his forehead the first season and by the second season you two had zero personal space in the tech center.”

Raven’s guarded look dropped away as she smiled. “He bought me some really fancy tech so I decided give him a bone.”

“Right, the heart eyes are just for the tech.”

This time Raven winked as she fixed Clarke’s microphone to the collar of her shirt. “Totally for the tech. Okay, you’re all set. Wick will be here in a sec to do the interview, he’s better at that kind of stuff than I am. Then you’ll give Bellamy and Octavia the tour of the house. Monty and Jasper will jump in at necessary intervals and then you guys will be free to go.”

“I don’t believe in ghosts.”

Raven shrugged like it didn’t really matter. “I don’t either.”

“What? But you work on a show which is solely about talking to ghosts.”

“I like the challenge of trying to prove or disprove something which is inherently impossible to prove. And I like the crew, they’re family.”

“Family’s important,” Clarke agreed solemnly but there was a catch in her voice which caught Raven’s attention and she received the look she always got when people realized she’d lost someone: a little bit of compassion mixed with a lot of pity.

“I get to travel all over the world with my hot boyfriend, too,” Raven added brightly.

“There’s that,” Clarke agreed with a smile, grateful Raven had dropped the subject and gave them both an out.

“You guys ready for me?”

Raven stepped back and smiled at Wick as he walked towards them, his disposition so leisurely and relaxed it soothed Clarke just to watch him come towards them.

“Yep, she’s all yours. Let me turn on the cams.” Opening two bottles of soda, she handed one to Wick. They both took long drinks before Raven settled in behind a trio of monitors and Wick walked up to stand on his mark. Setting the soda at his feet, he gave Clarke a friendly smile.

“This is just going to be a conversation. Only thing I need you to do is try to remember, when I ask you a question, to repeat the question back to me in your answer. So if I ask, what is your name?”

“I say, my name is Clarke Griffin.”

He shot her a grin, more sunshine than heat, and Clarke decided she liked him. “You’re at the head of the class. Most of the questions I’m going to ask you are going to be about the house, how you came to own it, what you know about the history, and lastly what kind of things are happening around the house to make you believe it’s haunted.”

“She doesn’t think it’s haunted,” Raven put in.

Wick frowned. Immediately, Clarke felt as if she had disappointed him.

“I just don’t think it makes sense-“ she began.

“Scientifically?” he finished for her. “It does though.”

“Oh god, here he goes,” Raven muttered.

Wick continued as if she hadn’t said anything. “Matter can’t be created or destroyed, only changed. So if a person dies who he, or she is, can’t be changed.” The pace in his voice picked up and she could physically see him getting excited about a potential debate. “They can only be changed, so what happens to your soul when you die? You just, _poof!_ , disappear into nothingness? Doesn’t make sense.”

“But you can’t prove a soul is energy,” Clarke argued. “You’d have to do that first in order to prove it lasts after death.”

“Why? When has science ever waited its turn in line?”

Clarke opened her mouth to argue but closed it again. Okay, he kind of had a point. Sometimes science discovered the truth before it understood the how or the why.

“You’ve argued this a lot, haven’t you?” she said instead.

“Almost daily. I should really learn to stay off the message boards. Reyes, give the guys a heads up we’re interviewing and to keep the sound down.”

Raven pulled out her phone and sent what Clarke assumed was a group text before sliding it back in her pocket. “All set.”

“All right," Wick rubbed his hands together. "Let’s do this.”

##############################

Bellamy’s first instinct when meeting the owner of the supposedly haunted house was that she was hot. Not in a Raven sort of way, or in the way his ex-girlfriend Roma was hot. More like being in the shade when it’s cold and chilly but suddenly the world shifts and the shade moves and the sunlight is falling on cool skin so the warmth just starts spreading and there are goosebumps everywhere the sunlight touches.

After five minutes into the tour of the house, it became clear she wasn’t just a skeptic, she was a realist, too. That made no sense, because after touring the attic, the second floor and most of the first, she showed them a small office set off the from the kitchen which housed art.

Actual art. The kind of stuff which hung in galleries and frames and were sold at Sotheby’s for outrageous amounts of money. She admitted it was her room, her art, and he’d never been so confused by a person in his life.

He stepped closer to his sister and kept his voice low as Clarke moved a painting while muttering to herself, ‘this isn’t where this belongs.’

“O, why don’t you take a minute to call your boyfriend?”

Octavia laughed, knowing him too well not to notice the flicker of interest and curiosity in his eyes.

“That wasn’t even a little bit subtle but I’m not going to argue,” she said. Stepping out of the room, she shut the door behind her, leaving him alone with Clarke.

She didn’t seem to notice.

“I didn’t realize you were an artist,” Bellamy began.

She gave him a self-conscious smile, “Yeah. I’m going to school for it.”

“Why?”

She narrowed her eyes and he realized how it must have sounded. Quickly, he went on. “I meant, why go to school for art when it seems like you already know what you’re doing. This stuff is amazing.”

He stopped at an oil painting of a girl curled up in an easy chair, her hair in a braid, reading a book. Above her the story took life in a myriad of images, showing that same girl with the same braid holding a sword and dressed in armor while dragons and castles and landscapes seemed to vie for space.

“I could maybe draw that dragon if you gave me something to trace,” he joked.

“I inherited the drawing talent from my dad. The art, he said I came up with myself.”

“Consider me well and truly impressed. I don’t suppose I could buy this from you.”

“You want it?”

He shifted his weight, feeling awkward at her surprise. “Yeah? It reminds me of when O was little and I used to read to her, or make up stories before she went to bed. She’d hear something like Percy Jackson and then decide she was the daughter of a goddess and spend the next two weeks trying to shoot a bow and arrow.”

“Artemis,” she acknowledged with a smile. “I’m more of an Athena girl myself.”

“Hades,” he admitted with a shrug.

“Appropriate,” she smirked but when he only tilted his head, confused, she shrugged. “You’re here to investigate ghosts. It’s not a far step from Hades.”

Bellamy laughed, “Believe it or not, I never actually made that connection before.”

She smiled as she shook her head. “You can buy it if you want but it’s not like it’s going to be worth anything someday.”

Bellamy studied the painting for a moment before turning to her with what he hoped was a deadpan expression. “Maybe after you die.”

Clarke laughed. “Then I’ll haunt this place and you can come over and tell me how much my art is worth.”

“Sounds fair.” He grinned at her. When he caught himself leaning into kiss the spring sunlight erupting from her smile he immediately stopped himself.

Bad idea. Worst idea.

She blinked as if she realized what he’d been about to do but instead of moving away or glaring at him there was the smallest of smiles on her face. For some reason he thought of that old Peter Pan movie and he suddenly understood the plot behind the secret kiss at the corner of Wendy’s mouth.

Well, if she didn’t think it was a bad idea then he was going to go for it. Just as he started to lean in again, someone outside made a large noise accompanied by what he recognized was Raven's cursing and the moment was gone.

He took a step back and reached for the door but when he turned the knob it didn’t open.

Clarke came up behind him, “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. The door is locked.”

“No it’s not,” Clarke argued. “This door doesn’t even have a lock on it.”

She swatted his hand away and he couldn’t help but be amused at how she’d gone from soft sunlight to hard steel in just a few seconds, as if she’d suddenly remembered she didn’t want him there. His grin only widened when she tried the knob and while it moved the door wouldn’t unlatch.

“Not again.”

“Again? This has happened before?”

She glanced up at him through her lashes, not because she was flirting but because he was a few inches taller than her. “I thought I wasn’t supposed to taint your perspective with anecdotal evidence?”

“I’m kind of the boss, so if I say it’s okay to tell me, it’s okay to tell me.”

“I’m not encouraging you,” she evaded.

“I should tell you, not telling me something just encourages me more.”

“You’re a pain in the ass.”

“Surprisingly, you’re not the first who has said that to me.”

“Not really that surprising.”

“Tell me when this happened before. No judgement.”

She stared at him for a solid five seconds and he thought she was going to refuse again. Instead she propped her shoulder against the door and crossed her arms. “I was dating this guy. He knocked at the door to pick me up for a date and the front door wouldn’t open. Jasper, Monty, and I all tried to open it, we locked it, unlocked it, we tried everything but we couldn’t open it.”

“What did you do?”

“Eventually it opened, but it took a few minutes. I think the door was warped.”

“Mhm.”

“You think it was a ghost trying to keep me from going on a date?”

“Would there have been a reason to keep you from the date?” Clarke bit her lip and looked away, immediately piquing his interest. “What?”

She sighed and he suspected from the sound she’d had to tell the story more than once. “I found out the next day he hadn’t really broken up with his girlfriend like he said he had.”

“He was cheating on you?”

“I think he was cheating on her,” Clarke shrugged. “He thought he’d broken up with her, she didn't agree.”

Some guy who was too lazy to break up with his girlfriend before moving on to someone new and when he came to pick her up the door wouldn’t open? “Someone’s looking out for you.”

“You think some spirit is hovering in my house protecting me from douchebags?”

“Haunting, not hovering.”

“You’re insane.”

“Because I believe in ghosts?”

“I don’t get you, you’re a smart man.”

“Thank you?”

“I Googled you,” she explained. “You were going for your Ph.D when you got sidetracked by all of this.”

He could tell by the dismissive wave of her hand what exactly she thought of ‘all this’ but he wasn’t about to tell her the why and how he got into this line of work, so he evaded.

“Sidetracked by a career which keeps me excited and allows me to not only work with my sister and my friends but also provides all of us with financial stability? Yeah, you’re right. I’ve made terrible life choices.”

“There is no proof ghosts exist.”

“There was no proof Alexander the Great could conquer the world, that didn’t stop him from trying to prove that he could, did it?”

“Alexander didn’t succeed.”

“He accomplished more than his father had. That’s a kind of success, don’t you think? So maybe I don’t prove empirically there are ghosts. If I find more proof than those who came before me, that’s a kind of success. I can live with that.”

##############################

It didn’t matter how nice the building, or the fact she was never really alone, Octavia couldn’t help the feeling of being on edge and just a little bit terrified when they turned off all the lights and started wandering around a strange place looking for ghosts.

She loved it.

She loved the old sounds of a house settling in, of doors creaking open but more than anything she loved the out of place sounds, soft moans and breathy whispers in the shadows, the sense of a presence just out of reach.

They didn’t always get results when they investigated a house. There were bound to be more than a few places which were just old, after all. She’d had a feeling about this place, though, from the moment she’d seen it.

Even though she knew next to nothing about the house you could tell simply by looking at it there was too much history for there to be nothing. Octavia likened it to a Civil War widow with stories of battles and blood and death in her living room, not knowing if her husband was somewhere living through the same. This place had stories to tell and a strong enough backbone to survive the hard times.

She also imagined if this house could talk, it would probably curse. Like a lot.

Some houses just had a wicked tongue that way.

The first hour passed by quickly and relatively quietly. They’d walked through the house to get their bearings in the dark and then had separated. Bellamy had gone towards the kitchen while she and Nathan had attempted an EVP session in the parlor-this place had a parlor, how cool was that? It was during that session she heard the sound upstairs. Immediately, she dragged Nathan, who was filming, along with her to investigate.

As she walked up the steps, comforted by the presence of Nathan right behind her, she kept her eyes fixed on the darkness ahead of her, watching for any change in the density of the shadows or light where it shouldn’t be.

She didn’t mind working with her brother but he always took the lead, and Wick was easily excitable whenever he was allowed to work a building. Raven, despite her adamant insistence she _did not believe in ghosts_ refused to walk into a house while they were investigating.

Nathan, on the other hand, was a steady and solid presence. If she jumped, he stayed calm. Because he was almost never affected by the spirits they investigated, it usually meant if he said something happened to him it wasn’t a figment of his imagination, it was real.

So when he jumped and yelled, he immediately had Octavia’s attention. Spinning around she reached out to grab his arm. “What? Are you okay?”

“It felt like someone just touched my side,” he bit out. “Shit, man, that was weird.”

Octavia reached her hand towards the space where Nathan had been standing moments ago. “It’s cold here. Do you have temp?”

He shifted the handheld before holding it out to her, “Take the camera.”

She took it from him carefully, holding it over Nathan’s shoulder so the screen on the handheld thermometer was visible through her lens.

And she could see, clear as day, when he moved the thermometer the temp dropped.

“It’s ten degrees cooler there,” she said aloud, amazed. “Did it feel like they grabbed you, or…?”

“No, it was like someone brushing up against you in a crowded room.”

“Here, take the recorder.”

Nathan reluctantly took the recorder she’d been holding in her hand and he held it out to the open room. “Now you ask questions, Nathan.”

“This is your job,” he muttered.

“The spirit touched you,” she pointed out, her breath quickening at the prospect of making contact. “You should do the talking.”

And for the next five minutes Nathan very awkwardly asked questions he’d heard Octavia and Bellamy use in the past and even though she had nothing scientific to back it up she would bet her next paycheck they’d gotten something on the audio.

“We’re not getting anything,” Nathan complained.

“We might finding something later, you know that.” But she traded with him, handing over the camera as she took back the recorder. At the same time Bellamy’s voice came through the walkie-talkie, the volume down low enough it wouldn’t startle them in the quiet of the house. “Hey guys?”

Octavia unhooked the device from her belt, “Hey, person.”

“Where are you?”

“Doing an EVP session in the second floor hallway.”

“Okay, I’m coming up to meet you.”

Octavia didn’t bother responding. Instead, she hooked the walkie back on her hip, then rewound the recorder to about where Nathan yelled about being touched and then started playing the tape.

There was mostly just Nathan’s voice, asking questions, followed by silence but after he asked “Can you show yourself” she thought she heard…something.

Bellamy appeared over Nathan’s shoulder, a camera in his hand but pointed to the floor. There was a static camera at the end of the hall capturing their images and Nathan had his camera so she figured he didn’t see any point in filming.

“Did you get anything?”

“I think so,” she stepped towards him, automatically moving so Nathan could easily get the two of them in a shot.

“Nathan’s ass got grabbed by a ghost.”

“Nothing grabbed my ass," Nathan protested. "It felt like someone brushed up against me.”

Octavia couldn’t help but grin at Nathan’s aggrieved correction. “There was a temp difference,” she added. “It’s all on film, but I had Nathan do an EVP and I think he got something. Listen.”

She played back the question and she watched as Bellamy’s brows furrowed in concentration, his head tilted slightly to catch the sound coming from the speaker.

“What is that? It’s not a word.”

“It sounds like a scoff,” Nathan piped up, but he didn’t sound happy about it.

“A scoff?” Octavia asked the same time as Bellamy.

“Yeah you know, like when you ask someone a question and they just scoff because the question is stupid? You should know, Bellamy, you do it all the time.”

Bellamy rolled his eyes but with that presumably in mind he rewound the tape and listened to the sound again.

“It definitely sounds intentional," he agreed. "I mean, there’s nothing in this hallway which could make that noise.”

In sync from years working together, both Bellamy and Nathan directed their cameras to opposite ends of the hallway as if to verify there wasn’t anything which could create a kind of scoffing noise.

There was nothing except a few paintings hanging on the walls, all of them still.

“Let’s do EVPs in the bedrooms,” Bellamy finally suggested. “See if we can’t get our friend to have a conversation with us.”

He turned to the closest bedroom as Nathan opened the door to the one next to him. Octavia made her way to the one across the hall from Bellamy and instinctively scanned the room she found herself in, finding the static cam they’d placed there earlier.

“Okay,” she greeted the room. “We’re going to see if Nathan’s new friend wants to talk. Bellamy’s got the spirit box, so I’m going to use the magnetic recorder we used earlier to capture the sound in the hallway.”

It was definitely a guy’s room. There were comic books everywhere and a desk wedged in the corner covered in notebooks and pens and a single empty square patch of wood indicating where a laptop once rested.

Jasper’s room, she remembered from the tour. He’d apologized for the mess and explained he was a writer and had gotten nose deep in writing and research so he’d forgotten to clean up till the last minute.

Sitting on the hastily made bed, she set the recorder on the comforter. She didn’t believe she was going to get any responses in here, though. While the hallway had felt occupied when she and Nathan had been there this room felt distinctly _empty_.

After ten minutes of talking, of asking questions, demanding proof of existence, she heard one of the doors open and Bellamy’s voice boom from the hallway.

“Fuck! Guys! You have to listen to this. I got a name.”

Octavia scrambled off the bed, leaving the recorder behind, and ran to meet her brother.

##############################

The reveal was one of Bellamy’s favorite parts of the show aside from the actual investigation. It was amazing to see the eyes of his clients go wide at a particularly clear EVP or unexplained image in infrared. Proof they weren’t crazy, proof their experiences were valid.

Even more, when those images and sounds they found corresponded with past experiences from eyewitnesses. Since he and the other watchers knew nothing about those instances, there was no chance of believing before seeing.

And if he could convince a skeptic there was more to the world than they’d thought the day before, all the better.

So when he sat with Octavia across from Monty, Jasper, and Clarke he did so with the pleasure of knowing he had a piece of evidence which the princess couldn’t dispute or ignore. He couldn’t wait to see her reaction.

But, because this was a show after all, they had to work their way up to it, so he showed them the clip from when Nathan and Octavia caught the sound of the footsteps above them. Clarke immediately shifted away as her roommates gaped.

“That’s totally happened to us before,” Jasper announced, leaning towards the screen.

Monty nodded, “It happens quite a bit actually, in different parts of the house.”

“It’s an old house,” Clarke pointed out, but she was looking at the screen as if she didn’t quite trust it.

“True,” Bellamy acknowledged and got more than a little pleasure at her look of surprise at being agreed with. “But in the entire night we never caught that sound again with any of the static cameras throughout the house. If it was just the building settling it would have likely happened more than once.”

Octavia leaned forward so Bellamy pulled back, allowing her to take over with the ease of having known and worked with her for his entire life. “After we heard the footsteps Nathan and I went upstairs to investigate and this happened.

“I apologize in advance for Nathan’s language.” She grinned and Bellamy was struck, not for the first time, at what a natural she was in front of the camera. Her awareness of how things would look once they were edited together and shown on television was unmatched. He knew, if he ever wanted to step back from the show and go back to school she’d be ready and capable of taking over for him.

Bellamy reached out and pushed play on the laptop. The video Nathan took of Octavia on the second floor began playing. When Nathan shouted all three of the civilians jumped.

Octavia and Bellamy grinned at each other as he paused the video.

“Has that happened to anyone before?” Bellamy asked.

“I sometimes feel like someone is walking past me, but I don’t think I’ve ever actually been touched,” Monty admitted. “Is your camera guy okay?”

Bellamy smiled at the note of concern in the man’s voice. “He was a little shaken up but he’ll be fine. Right afterwards, Nathan performed an EVP session and we got this.”

Pulling up the audio file he played the sound his friend had managed to capture.

“Do you guys hear that?” he asked when the audio stopped.

“Sounds like Clarke when she scoffs at us,” Jasper grinned at his friend who, ironically, scoffed in response.

“That’s what we thought it sounded like too,” Bellamy agreed. “We couldn’t find any other source for the sound. We can’t say for sure it was paranormal but it was definitely out of the ordinary.”

“After this Bellamy joined us and suggested we each take a room and conduct another EVP session to see if we could get another response," Octavia put in. "Nathan and I were the in guys’ rooms and after about ten minutes we heard Bellamy yell from Clarke’s room.”

This time Bellamy leaned forward, excitement and anticipation buzzing under his skin. “Do any of you know a man by the name of Jake?”

There was a female gasp and as Bellamy swung his gaze towards Clarke he saw Jasper and Monty's identical slack-jawed looks. Before he could say anything else, Clarke got up and all but ran out of the room.

Her roommates shared a knowing look before Monty shifted forward, his voice lowering when he spoke. “Jake was her father.”

Bellamy’s entire universe pinpointed on that single word, _was_ , and suddenly everything he’d heard made sense.

“He died,” he realized lamely and realized when he’d first met Clarke she had been explaining about how she’d gotten the house and he could just imagine she’d been about to say _I got it when my father died_.

“Three years ago. She's had a rough time,” Jasper added.

Pushing away from the table, Bellamy took off his mic and set it on the chair before picking up his laptop and following the path Clarke had taken. Following his instincts, he headed to the little office she’d made into a studio at the back of the house. There she was, standing in the middle of the room with her arms wrapped around herself as she stared at a painting resting on her easel of a man and a little girl playing on a beach.

He didn’t have to ask who the painting depicted.

“Clarke?”

“You didn’t look him up did you? That’s not how you knew his name.”

Her voice was shaky but her spine was ramrod straight and there was something about that he respected.

“We try to know as little as possible about the people who live in the houses we investigate to prevent contamination,” he reminded her.

“Jake was my father,” she finally admitted as she turned around to face him. There were tears making their way down her cheeks and his heart broke for her. “He died in a car accident. He had a brain bleed and my mom…she decided to take him off life support. I didn’t get to say goodbye.”

“Saying I’m sorry isn’t enough, but I am.” He touched her shoulder and led her to the worn out love seat she’d pushed against the wall and together they sat, their knees touching. “I’d like to play this for the show, but if you don’t want to be involved, I understand. We can edit out your portions and finish the reveal with Monty and Jasper. It will be as if you were never here.”

But he’d remember her. He couldn’t erase that as easily as frames on a film reel.

“But before you make your decision I want to answer a question you asked me yesterday. You asked me why I got into this. I didn't want to mention it then, but… You didn’t get to say goodbye to your dad before he died. I didn’t get to say goodbye to my mom before she died, either.”

There was a flash of surprise and empathy in her eyes.

“She was working at a convenience store when it was robbed,” he explained. “I got out of school and there was a cop waiting to tell me my mother was dead. Two months later I was beginning to think I couldn’t raise Octavia on my own and go to school and I was a mess. I was up late one night, about to give up when I heard someone say ‘I love you.’ I thought it was Octavia, so I got up to check on her but she was sound asleep. There was no one else there, and I didn’t think it had come from another apartment because it felt as if someone had whispered it in my ear.

“I told Nathan about it and he brought over a magnetic recorder because he’d Googled hauntings and the internet told him those worked best. I told him he was crazy, but we sat in the living room and when we played it back we heard--well, here, listen for yourself.”

Bellamy reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone. Flipping through his audio files to the oldest one, he took a deep breath and pressed play.

Over the tinny speakers both he and Clarke could hear himself and Nathan talking about his mother, about the problems he’d been having and when they paused in the conversation a whispery voice cracked through.

“Proud.”

Clarke glanced up at him, the immediate shock evident in her eyes. “What was that?”

He couldn’t say it, couldn’t vocalize the words in the back of his throat, written on his heart because if she called him crazy, if she denied it, the pain would be excruciating. “You’re the skeptic, you tell me.”

“Play it again.”

Bellamy obliged, rewinding a few seconds before pushing play so Clarke could hear the female voice again.

“That’s impossible.”

“Maybe, but you heard it with your own ears. What else could it be?”

Clarke took the phone from him and played the EVP again. There was something soft and sad about her face now instead of defiance and skepticism. “Your mom said she was proud of you.”

It was the awe in her voice which brought the tears to his eyes. “That’s what I believe.”

“Okay,” she finally sighed. “Play it. I want to hear what you heard in my bedroom.”

Bellamy cleared his throat before he picked up his laptop and opened it, pulling up the video file they would have played in the reveal in the dining room.

She put a hand on his arm. “Wait.”

He stopped before pushing play on the video from the static cam and met her eyes, wondering if she’d changed her mind.

He wouldn’t blame her if she had.

“You need this, don’t you? For your show?”

“I told you-“

“But this is what you do, isn’t it? Reaction and revelations, people realizing they might not have been right about the black and white of death. I’ve watched your show,” she added as if it was a confession.

“Yes, that’s what the reveal is about.”

“Then tape this. I may change my mind about having you air it, but I want you to have the option.”

He didn’t have a video camera with him and all the equipment had been packed up hours ago so he pulled up the laptop’s camera, angled it so the lighting was decent and since he could see Clarke’s mic clipped to her collar he knew they would have sound.

Then she reached over, took his hand and nodded. “Play it.”

When he pushed the play button his past self’s voice carried out from the speakers and almost immediately Clarke gripped his hand tighter as video-him introduced himself to whomever might be in the room.

He’d been by himself while Octavia and Nathan had done their own sessions in the other rooms, the camera placed on the nightstand while he sat on the edge of the bed, and he’d just been doing the usual conversation starters he’d done for every other session.

At the time there had been no indication he was going to the strongest, clearest response he’d ever gotten in his career.

“If there is anyone here with me, I just want to let you know if you want to speak with me the best way to do that is to speak through this little box. I know it’s loud but I should be able to hear you.”

Bellamy watched himself turn on the spirit box and Clarke shifted closer to him as if his presence could somehow soften the blow of what she was about to hear.

“Like I said, my name is Bellamy. Can you tell me your name?”

There was a lengthy pause and Bellamy remembered nearly giving up on hearing a response when a crackle through the white noise caught his attention and as clear as anything he’d ever heard was a man’s voice.

“Jake.”

“Oh, my God.”

There was desperate, anguished hope on her face as she covered her mouth with her free hand as if to stifle any other words which might slip out.

“I can stop.”

She shook her head as on the screen he looked surprised at the response he’d gotten. “Jake? Jake, what are you doing here? Why are you here in this house?”

Again, there had been silence but Bellamy hadn’t been willing to give up, not after receiving such a strong response so he kept asking questions until he got the one which he was now pretty was going to break Clarke’s heart or put it back together.

There was no way to know.

“Is there something I can do for you? Is there something you’d like for me to do?”

There was another pause but almost as if she knew something important was about to happen Clarke’s grip on his hand tightened and the hand covering her mouth shifted to shield her heart.

“Ache Care of her.”

“What? What did he say?”

Bellamy pulled up the audio file which he could slow down and replay easier than the video and in this version you could hear the end of a word which had been cut off before the man’s voice finished, “Ache Care of her.”

“Care of her,” Clarke repeated, sounding both awed and confused.

“I think, and the others agree with me, he was trying to say ‘take care of her’ but you only hear the last two letters of that first word but the rest of it comes through pretty clearly. He wants you taken care of.”

“I can take care of myself,” and she sounded so insulted he had to hold back a smile.

“Just because you can doesn’t mean you should have to,” he reminded her, his thumb making slow circles on the back of her hand. “Asking for help, accepting help, doesn’t make you any less strong.”

She nodded but he didn’t think she really agreed with him. “Is there anything else?”

“No, that’s it. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” she assured him, eyes falling back to the screen. “Can I have this? Can I have a copy, I mean?”

“Of course, I’ll have Wick send it to you.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t believe you.”

“I’ll forgive you if you say on camera I was right and you were wrong.”

Clarke laughed and even though it was watery she smiled through it, “I’m not sure I’m willing to go that far. But I will say thank you.”

She took a deep breath and met his eyes and almost immediately the air was sucked from his lungs at the intensity of those blue eyes. “Thank you, Bellamy.”

“You’re welcome.”

He reached up and brushed away a tear, the moment incredibly intimate with her hand in his, their bodies leaning towards each other and suddenly he remembered they were being recorded by his computer and his closest friends would be watching this moment and it was too private, too _theirs_ , to be shared so he pulled back and squeezed her hand once before letting go.

“I’ll have Octavia and Nathan finish the reveal. They can show this video to your roommates and let you take a moment to regroup. Then if you’re okay doing the exit interview, we’ll do that afterwards.”

She watched him pick up the laptop and stand up and something about the space between them made him feel a little empty. “Exit interview, that’s talking about the reveal, right?”

“Yeah. But only if you want.”

She thought about it, and he could almost see her weighing the pros and cons, one of which was probably admitting in some small way she’d been wrong about the paranormal. “I want.”

“Okay, I’ll see you in about an hour,” but when he tried to open the door it wouldn’t budge. He tried again but just like last time even though the knob moved, it wouldn’t unlatch.

“The door’s locked.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Clarke stood up and reached around him to try the door but it wouldn’t open for her either and then he heard her make a small sound behind him, a quiet gasp of realization.

“What?”

“What did you say after my dad gave his name?” she asked as he turned to face her, so close their clothes brushed against each other. “You asked him if there was anything he’d like you to do and he responded-”

“Take care of her,” he realized and suddenly the door unlatched and the window opened behind them and there was such a sense of peace in the room Bellamy could feel it in every atom of his body.

It felt as if the wind had come in and swept away all the grief, all the sadness, all the lingering gray and when he looked down at Clarke there was a look of peace on her face he hadn’t seen since he’d met her.

Had that only been yesterday?

Wind swirled in the room and around them, dancing through her hair and sending the paper sketches on her desk moving around the room.

“Do you feel that?”

She reached up to the grab the lapels of his jacket, pulling him towards her. “Yeah. Yeah, I do.”

When he kissed her, it was like finding a piece of himself he hadn’t known was missing. It was like tasting spring, and new beginnings.

When he pulled back her lips were parted, her cheeks were flushed, and he could feel his heart beating madly against his ribs.

“Did you feel that?” he asked with a grin, his nose brushing against hers.

“Yeah,” she smiled, her fingers tangled in his hair. “Yeah, I did.”


End file.
